Date: March 11, 2011

"The huge submerged bulk of the mental iceberg, with its stores of memory and acquired skills that have become automatic, like language, driving and etiquette, supplies people with the raw materials on which they can exercise their reason and decide what to think and what to do."

— Nagel, Thomas (b. 1937)

Date: October 31, 2011

"Scientists now know that the brain runs largely on autopilot; it acts first and asks questions later, often explaining behavior after the fact."

— Carey, Benedict (b. 1960)

Date: October 31, 2011

"And then there were the experiments, each one a snapshot into the dark box of the brain."

— Carey, Benedict (b. 1960)

Date: October 31, 2011

"In short, the brain sustains a sense of unity not just in the presence of its left and right co-pilots."

— Carey, Benedict (b. 1960)

Date: October 31, 2011

"It does so amid a cacophony of competing voices, the neural equivalent of open outcry at the Chicago Board of Trade."

— Carey, Benedict (b. 1960)

Date: October 31, 2011

"The brain’s cacophony of competing voices feels coherent because some module or network somewhere in the left hemisphere is providing a running narration."

— Carey, Benedict (b. 1960)

Date: October 31, 2011

"The interpreter [the left-brain narrating system] creates the illusion of a meaningful script, as well as a coherent self."

— Carey, Benedict (b. 1960)

Date: March 9, 2012

"If we acquire a bad habit this way it is very hard to change, because its grooves are so well worn in our minds."

— Wilson, Timothy D.

Date: March 17, 2012

"It forces the brain to resolve internal conflict, giving the mind a workout that strengthens its cognitive muscles."

— Bhattacharjee, Yudhijit

Date: April 15, 2012

"If the child's mind was a tabula rasa — a clean slate upon which, as Mao Zedong once put it, 'the most beautiful characters could be written' -- then a person's character and mind-set would not be immutable and God-given, but shaped and honed in the environment."

— Smits, Rick